


christmas, as it should be

by Darkpixel



Category: Phandom/The Fantastic Foursome (YouTube RPF)
Genre: Angst, Christmas, Family Issues, Fluff, Like lots of it, M/M, Phil being an angel, Strangers to Lovers, lots of tear, phandomchristmasexchange, veiled mention of depression, writer!Dan, youtuber!Phil
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-30
Updated: 2017-12-30
Packaged: 2019-02-24 05:45:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,328
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13207245
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Darkpixel/pseuds/Darkpixel
Summary: If people were to describe Dan, they'd say he is a grumpy boy that never gets out of his house. If dan were to describe himself, he'd say he is an utter failure of a writer with no future. If Phil were to describe him... he'd say that he is the man of his dreams, totally worth making a fool of himself ringing his door at any time of the day to ask for the weirdest things, just to get a glimpse of his incredible eyes...





	christmas, as it should be

**Author's Note:**

  * For [jestbee](https://archiveofourown.org/users/jestbee/gifts).



> This took me forever!!!! This is what happens when an artist tries to write, we should stick to what we know!!! I'm vividc.art, by the way, and this is my gift for the AMAZING writer that is AgingPhangirl (Madophelia). when I knew she was the one I had to write for... I was really honored, but I also panicked. HARD.  
> but well, I did my best, and I put my heart and complicated feeling towards Christmas so... i hope you'll like it.  
> And please ignore my mistakes, I'm sure there are... as english is not my first language...  
> Prompt was: “Dan and Phil are neighbours and Phil keeps coming round to borrow increasingly weird things so that he has an excuse to talk to the cute boy next door”

 

 

Christmas. Shining lights, crisp air, laughter, sweets, and warm hugs from your grand mother.

Prayers in the big big church.

Anticipation, running to your mother and father, jumping on their bed, because you really can’t wait!

Finding out that the plate of cookies has been eaten and yelling “he really has passed!” jumping around, and then opening all of those golden, shining presents that are waiting just for you.

And knowing that your parents really care, that they are there for you, just you, even if it’s just for one day. That day everything is perfect.

PERFECT.

You feel like you are at the centre of the world, and like everything is perfect…

 

Dan Howell didn’t remember all these things. Or better, he’d like to not remember them, but his mind always played tricks on him when Christmas approached… and that day was no different. He had dreamt of his childhood. AGAIN. Couldn’t the past just leave him alone, for once?

He slowly opened his eyes, to find the side of his macbook staring at him, casting a dim greenish light on his face.

His back hurt. Like hell. He was cold, and uncomfortable. Something was ringing. He could feel it drilling through his brain. Ringing, ringing.

“STOP IT, DAMN IT” he screamed, lifting his head.

Apparently he had fallen asleep on his desk. Again.

No wonder his neck hurt.

“I really have to stop pulling all-nighters…” he murmured, while his door bell rang again.

He looked at the screen of is phone: 8:05 am, 30 November 2014.

“Ugh. Who the fuck is at this god forsaken hour…” he grumbled, standing up.

“I’M COMING!!!” he screamed, cause who ever it was, they seemed to be too persistent to give up.

He swore to himself that if it was some vendor, or the annoying neighbours that wanted to complain about his video games blasting at full volume at three am again he was going to kill someone.

He opened the door…and froze.

“Hi!” the stranger chirped, “Do you happen to have a cheese grater?”

Dan could only stare owlishly at him.

_It’s too early for this…_

 

 

If someone were to describe Dan, and nobody would go to so much trouble, really, they’d say that Dan was a lone wolf.

Which he was, thank you very much. He hated people. And people usually returned the sentiment.

They would also say that he was a grump with no manners. Which he wasn’t. Not at all. Unless you took him the wrong way. Which people usually did. All the time. So it really couldn’t be blamed on him if he ended up snapping at everything and everyone that came too close to him.

He was a freelance writer. Or at least he tried to be. He wrote stories. He even published one book. That no one liked. They said his humour was “too dark”, his storylines too depressing.

Ah!

He also wrote for stupid newspapers and equally stupid websites, running a mediocrely popular section on a teen magazine about “millennial culture” to make ends meet.

All in all he considered his career a complete and utter failure. But it paid the rent…mostly.

All days started the same and ended the same, with as little human contact as possible, lots of junk food and the occasional visit of his editor that tried to get him to work more and faster. He really didn’t know how she hadn’t given up on him yet. Probably because her career was a failure as well. Who knew.

 

Nothing ever changed. Nothing.

And yet…

 

“Excuse me…?” he asked, distracted by very blue eyes, framed by thick black-rimmed glasses, and a fringe to match.

“A cheese grater! You know…that metal thing you use to…” the stranger started to make a strange motion with his hands. His extremely pale hands.

“to grate cheese” Dan concluded.

“Yes! That! Do you have it?” the man answered, clapping his hands and giving him a million pounds smile.

Dan sighed. _It’s too early for this_ he thought.

“Sure. Wait a second” he said, motioning to the other man to stand by the door. He really didn’t need anymore intrusions in his routine. Especially not from a freak that wakes him up at eight asking him for kitchen appliances. He didn’t even know what he wanted to do with it. Grating severed baby fingers for all he knew.

He had to rummage for a bit in his mess of a kitchen, as the blasted thing was at the very bottom of a cupboard full of all the things his mother bought for him that he never used. You don’t really need a cheese grater to make a sandwich.

“here it is”

“Oh thanks! I’m Phil, by the way! Your new neighbo---”

“Yeah, great, nice to meet you. You can keep it. I don’t need it. I’ve never used it, really, now if you’ll excuse me…”

_LEAVE. Please just leave!_

“Oh, but I’ll give it back! I just need it for a couple of hours, just to shoot-”

_Ugh. He’s the chatty type. Great._

“Crap, look at the time, I really need to go! Business meeting with my editor”

Which wasn’t exactly a LIE, Just a very convoluted truth. His editor had been trying to schedule a meeting for the new novel he should have started weeks ago for days now…

“Wow! Are you a writer? What do you write? Is it under the name Dan Howell?”

“Wha…how…no! I mean… I haven’t really written anything of importance, just trash. And how do you know my name?”

“You doorbell has your name written under it”

“Oh”

A moment of awkward silence followed, in which the stranger…well, Phil… kept staring at him expectantly, with a hand holding a cheese grater, and the other held between them.

Dan shook it.

“Well then!” Phil exclaimed, with a sideway smile, his tongue poking out on one side.

“Nice to meet you, Dan! You’ll have your cheese grater back in a couple of hours, thank you very much!” and with that, he left, to enter the door right next to his.

_It REALLY is too early for this…_

Was Phil stalking his new neighbour? Yes. Yes he was. He had run out of his house in the freezing cold rain at 6 in the afternoon to search for a book of which he knew nothing about except the name of the author, and he was doing that because the internet had said that it was the only published book written by Dan Howell.

He couldn’t help it.

He had needed a cheese grater to film a video, as you do, when you should be unpacking the mountain of boxes currently donning the living room of your new apartment. He was supposed to unpack, he had been ready for it but then he had gotten this idea…

So there he was, ringing the door bell of your brand new neighbour asking for a cheese grater, like a proper weirdo.

The guy that opened the door, of course, since Phil’s life absolutely sucked and the world hated him, was drop dead gorgeous.

He looked haggard, sure, with a tired face, an old t-shirt on that had probably seen better days and impossibly tousled hair. But his EYES. Phil had been told many times that his own blue eyes were stunning, but this guy’s eyes… they were like warm chocolate.

Phil was in love. It was a Christmas miracle.

Well, in truth it was still 25 days until Christmas. Still. A Christmas miracle. He could feel it.

Like in those romantic comedies he liked so much, he just had to lean casually on the door frame, drop a sensual smile, and swipe the guy off his feet with a charismatic phrase about going to get coffee together. Except for the fact that in the movies the counterpart was usually a tiny girl, and the male actor a lot more buff and handsome than him.

Phil pulled himself together, shaking his head a little. The cheese grater. He needed a cheese grater for his video. He was loosing himself in his day dreaming again, like he did a bit too often, though usually not in front of gorgeous strangers.

“Hi!” “Do you happen to have a cheese grater?” he had said, a bit too loudly.

To hell with the charismatic phrase.

And in fact his meeting didn’t really had any resemblance with any possible romantic fantasy his brain might have come up with. He had got a door slammed to his face. Quite literally.

“Oh well. At least I got the cheese grater…and a name…”

 

So there he was. In the closest library he could find, searching for the book “reason why I’m a fail” by Dan Howell. A fast research on the internet had given him all the info he could need in his quest for stalking his cute neighbour.

 _Well I AM buying his book. His apparently very interesting book. He should thank me, really. And I’m no weirdo._ He kept telling himself, while he was in line to pay for it.

_I’m just curious. Besides, this is a free country. I can buy a book if I want to._

And so on, and so fort he continued to argue with himself until he was back home, half an hour later.

He spent all night pouring on the book, a steaming pizza on its domino box on the floor, and a cocoon of unopened boxes all around him.

 

 

Phil did not return the cheese grater in two hours.

And the meeting with his editor, Claire, was shit.

“We are not going anywhere like this, Dan. YOU are not going anywhere like this. You have so much potential… why do you waste it in this way?” she had asked him, looking at him like a disappointed teacher. It had made him want to smack her in the face. Metaphorically of course.

You have so much potential, you are so talented, you are so original, you are so good, such a good little son. These were all words he had heard too many times and that had brought him nowhere.

“I don’t know what to write. I have no ideas. Honestly, I’ve tried! I’m just…stuck” he had answered, trying to keep his calm.

“Have you? You’ve tried? How? Laying on the floor staring into nothing for hours on end? I know you by now, Howell” she had sighed. That had really pissed him off.

“THAT’S HOW I THINK!” he had tried to defend himself.

“THAT’S HOW YOU PROCRASTINATE!” she had shouted back, only then to realize that they had attracted quite the attention, in the little Starbucks they were sitting at.

“Have you even tried going out for once? Meeting new people? Always staying cooped up in that dingy apartment does you no good…and I’m telling you this as a friend, not your editor” she had continued, lowering her voice.

He didn’t have much else to say after that.

Was she right? Yes, according to the general opinion of the common folks, he reasoned, but things weren’t so easy for him…

He had told goodbye to her soon after that, with a half assed promise to do better, and an even more feeble promise to send her something by the next weekend.

He really didn’t know why she still wasted her time with him.

So there he was, a few hours later, staring at his window, heavy rain falling outside, and a blindingly white opened word file.

It pissed him off. It was so white. Too white. It made him think of untouched snow, which in turn made him thing of Christmas. Like pretty much everything else in the whole freaking London. It was still November, for crying out loud! He hated Christmas. He didn’t even put up the Christmas tree, or any decoration. Not anymore…

He used to love it, once.

He clicked on his keyboard and track pad. Two simple flicks. The whole word page turned black.

“That’s better” he told himself, closing the lid of the laptop, and turning on his tv. Time to play some Guild of wars…

 

 

Phil returned the cheese grater the day after.

He did so, while asking for a paper cutter. Apparently he had a lot of box to open and had lost his own. Dan didn’t care. He just passed the requested object on and closed the door in Phil’s face again, while the other was still saying his thanks. _Maybe he will get the message this time,_ he thought, turning back to the paused game on the tv. He hadn’t slept a wink…but there was this new area of the map he really wanted to explore….

 

 

 

Phil did not get the message.

On the 2nd of December he ringed to ask for brown sugar, to make cookies, he had told him, and Dan had passed it on quickly, promptly stopping Phil’s explanation about wanting to make Christmas cookies for his mother that was visiting him soon and----SLAM.

 

On the 4th he asked for painting brushes.

“I had this crazy VISION about a galaxy background for my rave tree, it’s gonna be LIT do you maybe want to come and---”

“No, thanks, I’m busy”. SLAM.

_…a galaxy background for his rave tree? What the hell?_

On that day he realized how paper thin his walls actually were. He had to listen to what had to be the entire discography of tacky Christmas music for the WHOLE afternoon. “All I want for Christmas is you” had been basted at full volume on repeat for most of it. Dan wanted to reap his ears out. No amount of headphones could cancel that noise out. On that day, the only thing he wrote with white digital ink on black digital paper was “I want to kill my neighbour”.

 

On the 7th he asked for binoculars.

“why do you even think I HAVE binoculars?” Dan asked with a high-pitched tone. “well, you’re a writer” the weirdo had answered.

“…and?”

“Well, haven’t you seen the little prince?”

_what the hell._

Dan decided not to question it further. He went inside to search for the requested object, leaving Phil and his too bright smile at the door.

Dan didn’t even know he OWNED binoculars. But apparently he did.

He plonked them in Phil’s waiting hands saying “I don’t even want to know”.

This time he was baffled enough that he even forgot to slam the door. He closed it gently.

 

After that, for a few days, Phil’s flat was quiet. No Christmas music, no strange noises, no crashing china or Phil’s voice (the guy seemed to talk with himself a lot... Dan couldn’t really blame him for it) came trough the thin walls like Dan had gotten used to in the previous week.

The guy didn’t even come to ask for anything weird at his door.

Not even once.

For three days.

Not that it bothered Dan in any way.

Of course it didn’t.

He had peace. Finally.

Time to write.

Without interruption.

Except for the fact that… he hadn’t written a single word. Not even ONE.

Claire was coming back in a few days. Maybe he could elope. Or ask Phil to hide him for a bit. In exchange for all the things he borrowed. Yeah, that was the mature thing to do.

He started to try to imagine what he would find inside Phil’s house. He was probably some kind of murder. Or maybe he collected statues of cats. And he talked with them.

The blank black screen of his word file kept staring at him, accusingly.

Maybe he is an accumulator. One of those people with houses full of things up to the ceiling. Maybe that was the reason why he hadn’t come to bother him in the previous three days! A mountain of china cats had fallen on top of him, and he was trapped! Could be. Or maybe one of his victims’ family member had found him and was holding him hostage to get revenge. Or his previous neighbour had come back to kill him for one to many borrowed things.

He had to go and check. He was a good neighbour after all.

Extremely happy with his reasoning, Dan Howell got out of his house for the first time in a week. He didn’t even bother to put shoes on, or change clothes. He was only checking after all. He got out of his door in his grey track pants and tattered black hoodie, socks with holes in them and crazy curly hair.

Phil was probably out after all. He turned to the door close to his and moved his hand to ring the door.

What the hell was he going to do if Phil actually answered?

 _What the fuck am I doing?!_ He suddenly wondered. This was not his style. He didn’t care about people. And he didn’t like bothersome neighbours that came to ring his door bell everyday. He should just turn away and leave Phil under his mountain of murderous cats. That would get rid of all of his problems.

He turned to go back inside his apartment, shaking his head and murmuring to himself how stupid he was, when he heard a voice calling him from behind.

“Dan?”

_CRAP._

Dan turned slowly, and suddenly he regretted all of his life choices.

There was Phil, standing in front of him, holding a suitcase behind him.

Up to that moment Dan had only seen him wearing house clothes, baggy pyjama pants and hoodies, with his glasses on.

His glassed were nowhere to be seen now. He was wearing a nice black jacket with his fur rimmed hoodie framing his face, and VERY skinny black jeans. He looked… good. VERY good.

And there was Dan, looking like a hobo.

_Great._

“eeermh…” Said Dan, very articulately.

“Were you ringing at my door?” Phil asked, his smile growing bigger “do you need anything? Just wait a second!” He said, starting to look for something in his pockets, probably his keys.

“I… just… you didn’t come for three days and I was wonder if…”

_Did I just said that. What the HELL AMI I DOING, HE’LL THINK I’M SOME KIND OF STALKER, HE’LL CALL THE POLICE, HE’LL---_

“Awwww… did you miss me?” Phil asked, lowering his eyelids at him.

Dan froze. For a full minute, staring at his beautiful neighbour. Like an idiot.

After that minute had passed and Dan still hadn’t moved, Phil dropped his smile.

“I…that was a joke. As in… I was joking” he tried to explain, panicking.

Awkwardness hanged in the air heavily after that. Both men were looking anywhere but at each other standing like the two tallest imbeciles in the whole of London.

Dan shook his head, trying to get a bit of the stupidity out.

 _Fuck it_ he told himself _it can’t go worse than this._

“I was wondering…” he started, smiling at Phil for the first time “If I could borrow that dvd of the little Prince you were talking about? Do you have it?”

The smile that he got out of Phil after that warmed him more than the sun.

 

 

 

Phil’s house, it turned out, wasn’t full of Cat statues.

And neither stacked with the bodies of his victims.

It was instead really colourful and looked extremely cosy.

There were still some boxes here and there, but it already looked more like a proper house than Dan’s house ever did.

It was full of knick-knacks and posters from video games, movies and Tv shows that Dan hadn’t seen, with lots of silly pillows and LOTS of dvds and books.

Most noticeable of all, though, were the Christmas decorations that were literally EVERYWHERE: garlands, bobbles, tinsel, an children advent calendar with the proper doors already opened and the big, sparkly Christmas tree that occupied most of the small living room, with lots of presents already under it.

Dan had the strange feeling that he had just walked inside Santa Claus’ house in Lapponia. With a guardian of the galaxy spin on it ( _so that’s what he had need brushes for_ , Dan realized, looking at the pretty, a bit lopsided, colourful galaxy background behind the tree _was he even allowed to do that?)_

He found that, unlike most of the time he had seen Christmas decorations though, this time he didn’t mind. It was just so… Phil.

Dan wondered how he could tell, having talked with his neighbour just a handful of times.

Phil did indeed have the dvd of the little Prince, but even if Dan insisted that he could just watch it by himself, that he he didn’t want to impose on Phil’s EXAGERATED kindness since he had just come back from a trip, at the end Phil had it his own way, and Dan found himself sitting on Phil’s couch, surrounded by colourful pillows, a steaming cup of coco with melting marshmallows on top in his hands.

Dan was completely overwhelmed. He shouldn’t have stayed. What was he doing there? Sitting on his stranger of a neighbour’s couch, drinking coco and watching a kids’ movie with him? He should be writing. His meeting with Claire was going to be soon, and he had not written anything and he looked like a mess and…

And then the dvd started.

Phil switched the light off, and brought a blanket to cover them both, sitting beside him, a little too close.

A pleasant soft narrator voice filled the living room, illuminated just by the screen and the twinkling lights of the Christmas tree.

 _What the hell_ Dan thought _I haven’t felt like this in a long time._

Safe. Warm. Calm.

He brought his knees up against his chest making himself smaller and sipped his coco…and together they got lost in the world of the Little Prince.

 

 

 

At the song “equation” Dan started silently crying.

By the end of the movie he was full on sobbing.

Phil didn’t know what to do.

He had wanted to have a nice romantic evening with the man of his dreams, and he couldn’t believe his luck when he found said man waiting for him at his door. But this? What do you do when the man of your dreams starts to cry hopelessly on your couch?

He hugged him. At first tentatively, and then closer.

Dan let himself be hugged.

 

By the end of the credits he ad somehow calmed down, only hiccupping here and there.

Phil brought him a glass of water than Dan drank silently.

“… I cried too when I first watched, you know…” he tried to say, chuckling, to try and make it less awkward.

Dan didn’t answer, choosing instead to look down at his glass.

“aaaah….” Phil uselessly vocalized while Dan wiped his cheek with his sleeve “Right!” he jumped up.

He ran to the pile of bags he had dropped when he had entered his home earlier and took a bag of goodies that youtube gave him in the convention he went to the day before.

“Sorry” he apologized “ I should have given you some earlier…”

He handed the other man the packages of tissues that Youtube had provided him with.

Dan took it, starting at the bag first, and then at the tissues.

He blew his nose and then looked up at him with furrowed brows.

“Are you some youtube freak or something?” he asked.

“What?”

“Well, you have youtube branded tissues that you took out of a youtube branded bag. Fanboy much?”

Phil took this question for what it was, a drastic change of topic to try to ignore Dan’s outburst, and he went with it.

“Oh, no!” he laughed.

“I mean, I do like youtube, I own it a lot, but I’m not a fanboy, I’m a youtuber!” He explained, handing Dan his pass.

Dan stared at it.

It said, in bold font “Phil Lester, Creator”

“You? A Youtuber?” Dan asked, somewhat incredulously.

“Yeah! Is it that hard to believe…?”

Dan seemed to study him for a bit, kind of glaring at him.

“…no…”

 

After a while Dan left, bidding him goodnight and thanking him for everything.

He didn’t apologizing for losing his shit, or mentioned it again for the rest of his staying. Not that Phil wanted him to.

“Goodnight” he had simply said back, softly, closing the door on his retreating form.

 

 

“I’m not stalking him. I’m not!” Dan argued with himself several times that night.

It was by 3am that he gave up doing so, and finally turned his laptop back on.

Not to write, oh, no.

He had never cared much for youtube. While in high school and then university he had isolated himself from everyone, he refused any human contact, and hadn’t seen the point in listening to other people talking trough a screen when he refused to do so in real life.

Now he found himself typing in the search bar “Amazingphil” which was the incredibly silly name google had told him was Phil’s channel name.

He spent the rest of the night watching, nestled in a cacoon of blankets, trying to understand who “Phil Lester” was, even knowing that after his demonstration of madness earlier, the man probably didn’t want anything else to do with him.

 

 

 

 

That, apparently, was not the case.

At 11am, 4 hours after Dan had finally gone to sleep, someone ringed at his door, multiple times.

Dan opened the door, in a daze, to find a chirpy Phil, in his glasses, smiling big.

“Get dressed!” He said, too loud, “I’m borrowing you for the day!”

It took half a minute for Dan to process the whole situation, his eyes still struggling to adjust to the brightness that was a screaming Phil Lester after only four hours of sleeping.

“No we’re not” he tried to protest, weakly.

“Yes we are!”

Dan tried to shut the door in his face, but Phil stuck his foot in the door, still smiling menacingly.

“Yes.” Dan answered flatly “yes, we are…”

 

He should have started writing that day. He should have met Claire and have her yell at him, rightfully so.

Instead he got dressed, and got out of the house.

For the first time in a week.

“What are we even going to do?” Dan asked, shivering in his black coat while they waited for their bus to arrive “It’s fucking cold”

“I don’t know. I’m craving Christmas spirit!”

“well, I am not! I HATE Christmas!”

“That is blasphemy”

“I don’t care!”

Phil stared at him for a moment.

“Stop arguing. And ENJOY YOURSELF” he concluded, pulling the lapels of his coat tucking it closer to his neck in a mocking, but also tender gesture.

Dan tucked his face even further behind the high collar of his jacket. Like hell he’d let himself blush in front of the dork.

“You WILL be bursting with Christmas spirit by tonight. I swear it. Or I’m not actually amazing and my branding for the last 7 years has been a LIE!”

 

They started out in a cosy, fogged up Starbucks, and Phil insisted they buy only Christmas themed drinks.

He ended up with a gingerbread latte, while Dan ordered a Toffee and almond hot chocolate. They ordered food as well, for an early lunch.

“I feel like this was not the healthy option” Dan said, dubiously, lifting the cap of his steamy red cup.

“You don’t need to eat healthy, it’s Christmas!”

“Yeah, so why don’t we just die of sugar poisoning”

An easy silence fell for a bit. Dan hadn’t really enjoyed someone company like this for a long time.

“So…” he started “ I’ve watched your videos”

“Really??? You didn’t have to! Did you like them…? Which one have you watched?”

Phil asked back with too much enthusiasm.

_All of them._

_“_ Most of the recent ones, some of the older… you’ve been going on for quite some times and have 1 million subs! I didn’t know my neighbour was an internet celebrity!”

Phil blushed a little. It looked good on him.

“I’m nothing like that! There are a lot more youtubers way more cool and successful than me… I’m more of a youtube dinosaur, really…”

_They’ve got nothing on you._

“I like your videos a lot… they look…well, they look like you”

WHY was he even trying to compliment him? He lifted his gaze to find Phil starting at him intently.

_Great._

“And what do I look like?”

He had his glasses on. His hair in disarray cause he had been wearing his hood up. His cheeks were pink because of the hot air inside the Starbucks. His eye were fixated on him with that unblinking, creepy stare of his.

_You look perfect._

_“_ Like a dorky idiot who is probably lots of fun. Because he is a dork. And an idiot. Of course.”

“Ehy! I’m not PROBABLY lots of fun! I’m the life of the party! I’ll show you, I already told you! You’re going to have the time of your Christmas life today, you’ll see!!! Better Christmas date ever!”

_Date?_

Phil tried really hard to make good on his promise.

They started out, after lunch, at Covent Garden. Dan hadn’t come there in a long time, and never during Christmas since he had moved out to live by himself.

He remembered coming there with his parents once, when he was really little… but he preferred not to linger on the memory.

“Look at the decorations! They outdid themselves this year!”

The place was dazzling and sparkling like a fairy tale. Enormous red bobbles were hanging from the ceiling, and a gigantic light up reindeer on a sleight towered over them.

“Can’t you just feel Santa entering you?”

“WHAT THE HELL. NO. AND DON’T SAY THAT”

“What?” Phil asked, innocently.

“Never mind”

By the time they left his phone had vibrated in his pocket twice, Claire name flashing on the screen.

Dan ignored it.

 

 

“You serious?”

Later in the day Phil had dragged him on the other side of London to Hyde Park, in “Winter wonderland”.

“I’m not riding on that!”

“Yes you are. Come now, let’s get in line”

“I’m gonna look like an idiot!”

“No you’re not. Look, there are a lot of couples in line that are around our age! Nobody cares!”

Dan tried not to linger on the word “couple”.

There were quite a few, actually. But still. It went against all of his principles.

He was NOT going to ride on a carousel!!!

 

Phil picked two pink horses side by side for them. Dan had no other choice than climbing on top of one of them, the one closer to the centre, and more hidden from the crowd watching them. Just like he feared, his feet, like Phil’s, dragged on the floor. He awkwardly tried to hook them on the horse’s front legs.

“I hate this”

“Shush, you sound like the Grinch”

“And you are a bit too tall and your hair is not nearly fabulous enough to melt my cold, green heart, Cindy Lou”

“I don’t know, should I kiss and find out?” Phil asked with a way too self-satisfied smirk.

Thankfully the ride started just then, and the world begin to turn, allowing Dan to clutch at the pole and turn his face against it.

_Damn smug youtuber dinosaur._

The horse lifted up and down in the most annoying way, and the music filling the air was stupid. Everyone was probably looking at them and judging them. HARD.

He wanted this to end, how long could it last? Why had he agreed to this?

Then something touched his shoulder. He lifted his face and turned to look at Phil. He was smiling like a small child, framed by spinning lights. The world turned and turned, picking up speed, but Phil seemed to stay still, not looking at anything else but him, a halo around his face. He moved his hand from his shoulder to his cheek, stroking lightly.

Dan found he couldn’t help but smile, and lean into it. He straightened up, and realized than no one was looking at him. Or at Phil. Everyone was enjoying the ride. And so he tried to do the same. The world turned and turned and he laughed, looking at Phil spreading his arms and almost falling off.

He felt…light.

 

He turned his phone off after that. The count of lost calls amounted to four now.

He didn’t care. He had lived for far too long cooped up in his hole of an apartment, plastered to his phone, his tv or his laptop.

But this afternoon with Phil was starting to feel important. His problems, Claire, the book, his family… for the first time in a long time he felt like he could leave them behind, even if it was for just a few hours. He couldn’t explain why, if someone where to ask him. The man standing in front of him, in line to get two cups of mulled wine and two mince pies had crashed in his life just a few weeks before. He didn’t know anything about him, except that he was a weirdo with a youtube channel. But he found that he was willing to know more. He found that, unlike other people that he felt like pushing away after only a couple of minutes, Phil… he wanted to KNOW HIM. For real. He… WANTED him. For himself. He had never much cared for love, or dating. He had had a girlfriend for three years, but it was a childish thing. He didn’t trust people enough to let them close. But there Phil was, walking towards him trying to get the two cups and sweets back to him without spilling everything on the floor.

He was so clumsy, so weird, and so, so endearing.

He took the cup, feeling it warming him to the core. Phil’s hand, in contrast, was as cold as ice. Dan wanted to warm it up. He found no reason to not do so and so he took it. If Phil was surprised by the gesture, he didn’t show it. “ready to go?” he just said, his glasses fogging up by the smoke coming from the wine.

 

 

 

 

Something had changed in Dan after the carousel ride. Phil didn’t know what it was, but he thanked Santa, miss Santa, and all the reindeers and the elves.

Dan was smiling at him now, he was HOLDING HIS HAND. His hand was so warm, and soft. Bigger than his, but fitting against his own just so.

He didn’t know what he had done to deserve this, but he didn’t fight it. Dan didn’t let go of it even after they climbed in the metro to go to the skating ring by the Natural History museum.

They sat really close to each others, almost on top of each others, and again, Phil wasn’t complaining. He was practically floating. Dan was smiling at him. Smiling! He had dimples, one more prominent than the other. Phil was in love with them. And his eyes. His chocolate eyes. And his lips. His chapped, but full and soft looking lips. He couldn’t get enough of looking at him. They talked and talked, never seeming to get out of things to tell to each others. And he couldn’t stop himself from spilling all of his most embarrassing childhood stories, only to see those dimples again. And again. Dan’s laugh was loud and obnoxious. Many heads kept turning disappointed looks towards them, but Phil didn’t care. He loved it.

 

When they finally got on the skating ring, Phil knew he was going to make a fool of himself. He was a baby deer on skates. But in the end his humiliation paid off.

Dan held his hands, leading him on the ring with firmer strides than his.

They did a couple of rounds, admiring the giant Christmas tree on the middle of the ring, and the overall beautiful scenery.

At one point Phil stumbled, Dan catching him just in time.

Phil tried to get back on his feet, clinging to the dark material of Dan’s jacket.

Their faces met, really close.

“Really?” Dan asked, wit a smirk “we’re that cliché?”

“Why not…?” Phil asked back, getting back on his feet more firmly, to get the twos missing inches necessary to do it just right.

“Why not” Dan conceded.

They kissed. In the middle of the ring, their lips warm and dry and sweet. Oh, so sweet.

Dan lingered for a bit, after, his eyes almost covered by his long lashes, and then pulled Phil’s hood up, leaning his brow against his, chuckling “wouldn’t want your million of subscribers to see this, right? Internet celebrity…”

 

Phil didn’t remember getting back to their complex, not really. He paid for a taxi, probably.

When they half stumbled in his apartment, Phil was really thankful for having forgotten to turn down the heating the day before. The living room was pleasantly warm, and taking off their clothes didn’t feel like a sacrifice.

They didn’t even have to talk about it, they just did it, in unison, their hands exploring the other’s skin, committing it to memory. They couldn’t get enough of the other, pressing lips on skin, raising hairs and dragging out low moans.

It was slow, and clumsy and hungry, and comfortable.

“Perfect” Phil sighed, settled on his couch, Dan straddling his tights, his hand traveling lower, and lower down Dan’s soft belly… “you are perfect”

 

 

They didn’t move form the living room after, and didn’t turn on the lights, content with the soft glow of Phil’s Christmas tree.

Phil had just dragged his blue and green duvet on the sofa, and they had huddled up together under it, Dan on top of him cause they couldn’t really fit on side by side.

Dan was quietly stroking Phil’s arm, playing connect-the-dots with Phil’s freckles. He seemed to like them quite a lot, just as much as he seemed to love Phil’s fingers caressing his curls.

“we should eat something” Phil said softly.

“mmh… later”

“You’ve already said that half an hour ago!” Phil laughed.

“Mmmmh…” Dan raised his head, crawling up Phil’s chest to get his face levelled with his “but I’m not hungry yet” he whispered with a feline smirk on his lips, while he mouthed at Phil’s chin.

“Stop that. Or we’re never leaving this couch!”

“Who said I planned to leave it?”

Phil pinched the skin at his sides, just where he had this soft curve that Phil had found just an hour before extremely comfortable to grab onto.

“Ehy! Leave my chubbiness alone”

“What time is it?”

“Don’t know, don’t care. My phone is turned off and somewhere in that pile of clothes over there, and as I said, I have no intention of leaving this couch!” Dan grumbled back, trying to find some skin to pinch back near Phil’s ass.

“Turned off? HOUCH, stop that!”

“yes. I…didn’t want anyone to disturb us”

“But what if someone from work were to call?”

“…They did”

“Then why you didn’t answer?”

“I didn’t want to…”

“But…”

“Please. I don’t want to talk about it” Dan tried to conclude the conversation, burrowing his face on Phil’s chest.

Phil didn’t like the sound of that, how dark and defeated Dan’s voice had turned, but he decided that for the moment, it was best to ignore it.

 

 

The morning after he woke up way too early. It took him a moment to remember what ha d happened the day before, but when he did, he turned on his pillow to find Dan on his side, facing him, snoring softly. He smiled, and kissed his cheek, softly, as to not wake him. Dan always had these dark circles under his eyes, better to leave him sleep. He pondered remaining in bed basking in the adorableness of his… boyfriend? Only thinking about the term made his stomach flutter.

In the end, however, he remembered he didn’t have anything for breakfast to offer Dan, and has they had ended up skipping dinner the night before, than would not do.

He silently slipped out of bed, got dressed and got out, to go get something in the nearby Starbucks.

When he got out of the door, he found a woman ringing at the door next to his. Dan’s door.

He debated for a bit whether telling her that Dan wasn’t at home or not, but at the end, her worried expression convinced him to intervene.

“Erm… miss... Dan Howell isn’t at home at the moment! But if you want, I can tell him you were searching for him when he…gets back”

She turned to look at him, checking him out from head to foot for a second.

“You know where he is?” she asked, a bit frantically “I’ve been trying to contact him all day long but he didn’t answer me…”

“yeah, well…. He was with me”

Her stare turned a bit more piercing after he said that.

“I mean, we went out and his phone… his battery… it switched off”

He had always been a terrible lair, ever since he was a child. But if this woman noticed, she didn’t say anything.

“And now he isn’t home?”

“…no…”

She sighed and reached in her bag hading him a fancy business card.

“I’m Claire Callagan, his editor. We were supposed to meet yesterday to talk about his new book but… well, I have a feeling you know better than me why he didn’t turn up” she concluded, still kind of glaring at him.

Phil felt a bit guilty.

He hadn’t really bothered to ask Dan if he had been busy the day before when he just dragged him out of his house. But then again, Dan hadn’t protested against it. Not really.

“I’ll tell him to call you!” He answered finally, smiling kindly at her.

“Thanks” she considered him a second more and then added “actually, could you walk with me for a bit? I… I’d like to talk to you about something”

They walked together to the Starbucks, and when Phil got back to find Dan still sleeping, sprawled across the whole bed like a star fish, he had a plan.

 

“To be honest, I’m not supposed to tell you this, mister…”

“Lester. Phil Lester”

“Right. Mister Lester. But I’ve known Dan for four years now, and I care about him. I’ve never seen him get close to anyone, but apparently you succeeded where many others have failed” she gave a pointed look to the two cups he had just bought, and the two cinnamon muffins. He didn’t comment.

“I’m speaking as a friend more than his editor, because I’m worried. He hasn’t been writing for a long time, he is discouraged and, I’m afraid… sad. I’m not a specialist and I can’t really get him to talk much so I’m not as arrogant as to make a diagnosis, but… what I’m trying to say is… take care of him, would you? I don’t think he has anyone else to relay upon, as far as I know, he doesn’t talk with his family. Tell him that he has time until January to find an idea for his new manuscript; I’ll work things out with the higher ups. He has potential… but he should really stop wasting it”

 

 

 

 

When Dan woke up, it was to Phil gently stroking his face, the smell of warm coffee filling the air.

“Hey” Phil greeted him “what do you say to spend Christmas up north with my family?”

 

 

 

At first Dan protested. GREATLY. The idea of meeting Phil’s family made his stomach churn.

Weren’t they going a bit too fast? Sure, they had slept together at their first date, and it had been MARVELOUS, and he ADORED Phil, but…

“What if they don’t like me…? I’m not exactly the kind of person you’d be proud to present to your mother…”

Phil seemed to get angry at that.

“Stop talking nonsense! They are going to LOVE you. And honestly my mother already can’t wait to meet you and is probably bursting in anticipation at the idea of having another mouth to stuff with mince pie and pudding!”

“You already told her!?!”

“I tell her everything”

“…everything…?”

“Well…not EVERYTHING.”

 

That settled it.

On the 21st of December, Dan found himself on a train directed straight to Manchester, were Phil’s overenthusiastic family picked them up by car, in a whirlwind of hugs, kisses and “it’s so good to see you!!”

 

The first day, Dan was constantly waiting for the second shoe to drop. A family like that could not exist. Surely they were just being polite, they were just wearing their “holiday mask”, like families do when they host someone and have to act like everything is perfect. A perfect house, a perfect table, perfect smile, perfect politeness. But where were the angry whispers behind closed doors where others couldn’t hear? Where were the cold stares that carried unresolved tensions? Where were the skeletons? The badly hidden hate? The resignation?

Surely it was a frail balance. And he had to be careful not to brake it. So he tried really hard to behave at his best. Always smiling, always being polite, being the first one to get up to get a thing needed, opening doors, carrying things.  

It was exhausting.

 

By day three he wasn’t so sure that it was all fake. If it was, there should have been a slip up by then. A muttered apology, some kind of awkward accident.

But the Lester family remained perfectly happy, cheerful, warm and welcoming.

Phil’s mother and father, in particular, treated him like they did Phil. They didn’t try to coddle him, or make him feel like he was an outsider. He felt… a part of something.

It was an emotion he hadn’t felt for a long time, and suddenly, the evening of the 24th, he felt overwhelmed, and surreptitiously left the room to go on the balcony, where there was no one. He needed some air, some space to think.

To remind himself that this wasn’t real. Not for him. He and Phil had been together only for two week. Two weeks were nothing, anything could happen. And the more you get attached to something the more it hurt when you lose it. Better be careful.

It was freezing cold outside, especially since it had snowed copiously he wasn’t wearing a jacket. Everything was white, and quite, and blue. Hear and there orange windows threw a warm point of light on the canvas, like stars.

“It beautiful, isn’t it?” asked a familiar voice behind him “I wish it would snow more in London. I miss snow”

Phil came closer and put his hands on his shoulders.

“You’ll catch a cold like this”

Dan didn’t say anything. When Phil hugged him from behind, he just leaned into him, letting out a long sigh that took shape in front of him in swirling mist.

“Aren’t you having fun…?”

“I…I am. I just… I’m not used to it”

“Used to what?”

“To… people. Fun. Company…family…”

“Dan…”

Phil forced him to turn to face him, and placed his hands on Dan’s cheeks, squeezing.

“Dan, I… didn’t ask. Cause I didn’t want to force you. I wanted to wait for you to talk to me. But… I know we are basically strangers, still, but I… I care for you. A lot. I’m not leaving. Dan, I’m not going ANYWHERE. I’m here. Talk to me. Share your problems with me. Please…. Don’t shut me out.” Dan had started to cry at some point, and Phil pushed the tears aside, with his thumbs “Please…?”

Dan took Phil’s hands in his, kissing both of his palms, crying harder, but laughing at the same time too.

“Yes. Yes. But beware, Phil Lester… I am a mess”

Phil laughed too, hugging him “we are two grown ass men freezing their asses off standing on a balcony with no jackets and crying while they laugh on Christmas night. I think we both are. Definitely”.

 

After cleaning up and calming down, they came back to the others. They probably still looked awful, but no one asked anything. Only Phil’s mum looked at her son for a moment and nodded.

“There you are. Took you long enough!”

They settled down to play games. Dan sat by Phil and looked at the rest of the family.

He noticed that Phil’s mother was actually wearing a pair of horrible Christmas boops on her head. His brother was slightly tipsy and throwing obnoxious comments at his girlfriend, which was hitting him upside the head. The room was a mess of empty plates and discarded gift wrappers.

There was no perfection to be found anywhere, no gilded pictures from magazines. It was a real, normal family. Or what a real normal family should be. So he stopped trying to act all perfect himself. He shouted at the television, made obnoxious jokes, elbowed Phil in the ribs to try and distract him while playing Mario cart. He had fun. Lots of fun. Like he hadn’t in any Christmas since he was little.

Warmth, lights, food, fun, and family.

Christmas as it should be, finally.

 

 

 

The day after that, they went on a walk by themselves and Dan told Phil EVERYTHING. Abut his writer’s block, about the loneliness, the lack of purpose, the feeling of going nowhere. Every day the same, every day empty.

And he told him about his family.

His family he used to love so much, the parents he had hoped all his life would finally show they cared about him. The family that had let him down one too many times. The fight with his dad that finally led him to walk away from them and never look back. His mother still called sometimes, but lately Dan had stopped answering. Cause he was too much of a failure and was ashamed. At her asking “how is work going” what was he supposed to answer? So he had just postponed, and forgotten and acted like it was ok to not talk to your own mother.

“And now I miss her. I miss all of them. I miss my brother. I don’t even know if he went university or not. I miss our dog. And I miss … my dad. He got angry with me cause he said I was going nowhere with writing. That it wasn’t a real job. And he was right! He was… fucking right…”

Phil hugged him close. Really close.

“I’ve seen your family, so close, and I wished we could be like that. We used to be like that. I… I want them back, but I don’t know how!”

“Dan… they are your family! I’m sure they miss you too!”

“But I’m a disappointment!”

“You’re not! You’re so young and yet you’ve published a book!”

“That no one liked!”

“I liked it!”

Dan froze “you… you’ve read it…?”

“Yes! And it was brilliant! Funny, smart, sarcastic and honest! And I’m not the only one that liked it! I’ve found your book searching for it on the internet, there were many people talking about it! People that follow everything you write! You should put yourself out there more. Open a twitter! I don’t know… forget about the critics, you’re not writing for them, are you…? What are you writing for?”

“I…”

He had started writing cause he wanted to reach others. He had things to share, stories to tell… “I write cause I want people to read… to listen”

“ Then write. Talk. Don’t close yourself off. Share yourself. I’m just a small youtuber, but I understand the struggle… sometimes I don’t have any ideas about what to make videos about, so I just sit in front of the camera and…talk. I talk about myself, my dreams, my strange encounters… do the same. Write about what you are. Don’t care about what is trending, or what others like, or what is normal. Normalness is boring. And boring, you are not”.

 

 

December 2016

 

“Dan! Honestly, I can’t believe it! We are GONNA BE SO LATE! The taxi has been waiting for fifteen minutes already!!!”

“I know, I know!” Answered Dan, rushing down the stair, his luggage trailing behind him stomping don each stair.

Have you taken the book?”

“…Yes”

They threw themselves in the taxi, ignoring the annoyed stares of the driver.

Phil sighed, happy they were able to make it.

Dan looked out of the window, to see the door to their shared house disappear around the corner.

A lot had happened in the past two years. Lots of fights, lots of tears, lots of problems with his publishing house, that he had changed twice.

He still talked with Claire, he owned her a lot.

He and Phil had moved in together in a bigger, better apartment. Dan had been happy to leave his old one behind, he closed the door on the gloominess on last time and never looked back.

He had tried, and mostly succeeded, to have an healthier life style, eating better and moving more. MOSTLY succeeded. Mostly.

Phil’s youtube channel was still thriving; he was almost at two million subscribers. Dan had made more than one appearance in it, they even had a ship name. “Phan”.

They didn’t really come out publicly… but they didn’t need to. Phil’s subscribers weren’t stupid.  
Dan found he didn’t mind, not really.

He was going to therapy now, and after changing many doctors he had finally found one that fit him just right. He was working with her one many issues, and one day, he had decided to face one of them.

He had dialled the number in his phone, and, while holding Phil’s hand, he had hit “Call”.

His mother had picked after only a few rings.

They talked a lot, cried a lot, and the day after she was at their door.

Not everything was forgiven, and there was still a lot of work to do, but she had listened to him. Properly LISTENED. Like she had never done before.

Now he was about to make another step forward, a pretty big one.

He gripped the book he was holding tight, until his knuckles turned white.

Phil, as always, noticed straight away and clasped his hand over his.

“It’s gonna be alright, they are going to love it”

It wasn’t the gift he was worried about. The problem was all the hope that was about to burst in his heart. Too much, too strong, too REAL.

He had waited for this day for so long.

The day he would walk back in his family house, holding his work out for them, like an offer, to say “I did it. It’s real. Have I made you proud?”

“And even if they don’t, I’m here. And I’m so damn proud of you” Phil added, turning Dan’s face away from the window and towards him.

He always knew the right thing to say.

They kissed, uncaring of the driver watching them from the rear view mirror.

 

 

An hour later they were left, luggage in hand, in front of the Howell house.

It looked just like Dan remembered it, but…smaller. No longer the black hole of desperation it had looked when he was growing up.

Just a house.

 

Dan clasped the book he was holding to his chest.

The only part visible, above his arm was “New york times best seller, from the emerging Author Dan Ho--”

“Ready?” Phil asked.

“No”

Phil chuckled, and dragged him by the hand he was clasping “come on”

Dan took a deep breath.

It was going to be all right. He knew that.

He was not alone anymore.

He ringed the door.

 

 

It was going to be all right.

 

**Author's Note:**

> Please go and check AgingPhangirl's works, she is the REAL writer.  
> As for me, you can find me at vivianadichiara.tumblr.com, where I post my phanarts :)  
> To all a wonderful 2018!!!


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